Dr. Peter Bradlee’s family connection to the Boston Tea Party
The Boston Evening Traveller of December 17th, 1873, describing my ancestor’s history exactly a century earlier, said "Sarah Bradlee assisted her four brothers, Nathaniel, Josiah, David, and Thomas Bradlee, and John Fulton, to disguise themselves as Indians, and saw them take part in throwing the tea overboard." Nathaniel Bradlee was my great, great, great, great grandfather.
Nathaniel was 27 years old at the time he joined the patriots who destroyed the British tea. He was born on Feb. 16, 1746 and was a native of Dorchester, MA. It is written that friends and neighbors, who were some of Boston's most devoted patriots, regularly gathered at his house on the corner of Tremont and Hollis streets to enjoy his codfish suppers on Saturday nights. Mr. Bradlee, a carpenter, was a member of the group of merchants and craftsmen called Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association. Many other participants also belonged to this group with Paul Revere being the most famous.
Nathaniel Bradlee’s older sister, Sarah, has been called the "Mother of the Boston Tea Party." She was given this name for helping patriots to disguise themselves as Indians for the Tea Party when they gathered before heading to the Griffin’s Wharf. The same source also mentioned that patriots had meetings in her house on other occasions. Sarah is credited for being the one who came up with the idea for patriots dressing up as Mohawks. She was also one of the prominent members of a women-patriots organization called “The Daughters of Liberty.”
She was born in 1740 as Sarah Bradlee in Dorchester, married John Fulton in 1762 and moved to Medford. She was involved with the Revolutionary War on several occasions. In June 1775, after the Battle of Bunker Hill, she organized women to nurse wounded soldiers. In March 1776, she volunteered to dispatch an important message from John Brooks, the mayor of Medford, to George Washington who was at the Charleston war front. She was, essentially, the first American female spy. She managed to cross the enemy lines and return home safe. Still later, during the Siege of Boston, she and her husband used their own ship to provide the American troops in Medford with wood and fuel. After the war, George Washington visited her.